Still, we go and exercise our “right to suffrage”, because we believe that it is only right that we should do our duty in choosing leaders. We know that time and time again, the same people, faces, in fact, old and hateful personalities come around to convince each electorate that they deserved to be reelected, even if they hardly contributed through the years that they are supposed to serve the people.
We know for a fact that these old politicos are there not to be servants of the people, but continue fattening their piggy banks, and their fantasies of being masters of the grueling, impoverished masses. Yet, still, some of us continue to believe their lies, by putting them back there where they do not deserve to be, those trapos.
I do believe a lot of people have been disillusioned by the farce that election has become since time in this country. Filipinos are an intelligent lot. But then, those in government who have learned the wicked ways of deception and have mastered it and amassed wealth at the expense of many who toiled for a living could not stop because it has become a machination.
Each time election comes around, I always have that sneaky feeling that the Filipinos are being hoodwinked again and again into believing that we have elected again those dirty politicians.
Just like the brazen way that the former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo did, who shamelessly admitted to the “Hello, Garci” scam. It was really pathetic and yet, where is she now after having been arrested for the greatest blunder she’s done? Scheming that she is, she sneaked her way back to power, after the presidential daughter gave her the best “come back” to the leadership in the lower house.
With all the drama of a coup de tête or coup de grâce or whatever it was when Arroyo was again installed to “power,” it just illustrated the kind of dirty politics at its most ignominious. Yet we are still hoping against HOPE, the way we did during that deceptive presidential election when, in all honesty, we voted for a person whom we thought could finally bring genuine peace in this troubled land, but turns out he was just another “monster in sheep’s skin”, and look at the consequences that we are forced to suffer to this day?
Thus, even without any survey, one can feel the reluctance of the citizenry to be fooled once again. Have we learned our lessons this time?
Mind looking around walls and fences in the city. Do we like all those garbage we see strewn and flaunted around by the “moneyed” and the infamous? It makes me feel really sick to see political ads everywhere, so mindlessly pasted wherever one looks, and imagine hundreds of pesos being thrown away on these useless, wasteful exercises.
That is why I have vowed to myself to vote (if ever I still would) for candidates who are not big spenders, those whom I could see little ads if none at all elsewhere. The big spenders will surely make sure that the millions or billions he/she poured on the campaign trail will have a “return of investment” (ROI) as soon as they are seated in power. That, we are certain of, like the practice of dirty, veteran politicians (sa panloloko) have been doing time and again.
Vigilance should no longer mean sticking our noses on election results because the counting and tallying are nothing but distractions because they can easily change numbers with just one click of a button. To be vigilant means doing our little efforts to campaign against the crooks, the liars and the scheming candidates who are milking us, Filipinos.
Let us not let this trapos make a fool of us again! Let us put them where they deserved to be: to the dustbin of history! It’s easy to spot them… their campaign ads are usually unlimited, “sky-is-the-limit” flow of posters, ads in all mass media, and that old tactic of using so-called ordinary folks to talk about their rotten lies.
Pray, let us be discerning and conscientious this time around. (davaotoday.com)
